Cruel Hearts
by Ash The Wanderer
Summary: The worst has come to pass, and all that is left is madness and terrible cruelity...or is it? Reality is not always what it seems...or sometimes the sins are just beginning...


**__**

Cruel Hearts
    
    The figure lay slumped against the wall, darkness shrouding him like a menacing cloud. The figure wore a torn red karate gi, filthy and stinking. His hair, matted and laced with dirt and blood, yet still in the family gravity-defying style that those who knew him would recognize, slumped apon his head as if in defeat. The figure stared at the ground with baleful, dull eyes.

His tongue thick in his mouth, Son Goku slowly rasied his head even as it caused his neck to cramp painfully, and for the millionth time looked apon the stone wall in front of him and wondered just what had happened.

He'd never seen a thing, hadn't sensed anything, hadn't had a clue of any kind. One moment he had gone outside to look at the sunset with Goten and then suddenly he had been surrounded by blackness. Before he'd had the time to react, he had heard a scream and then something immensely heavy slamming on the back of his head, even as something reached into his mind and alit it in an agonizing numbness, sending him spiralling down into the darkness that had consumed him without even a chance to scream.

And when he had awoke, he had been here, chained to the wall. He had tried to free himself and found he could not, no matter how hard he pulled. He son discovered the coller around his neck, and also soon discovered the burning pain that lanced through his body if he even touched it. Whatever it was, it blocked his abilities, leaving him as weak as a human baby.

That had not stopped him from trying to escape, as he tried every plan he could think of in the next five days. His chains kept him from going anywhere except the nearby latrine, but that had not stopped him as he tried everything he could to bludgeon, cut, or sever the collar around his neck or the chains that held him.

He had failed. He had not been fed or even given water, and his efforts had slowly grown weaker and weaker, until he was left limp, barely able to move.

In his apparent surrender, he was then appeared to have been granted mercy, asa panel slide open and deposited a bowl full of water in his reach. Goku had nearly knocked the bowl over in trying to grab it and drink it down.

The water revitalized him, and he again tried to escape.

And again failed.

He refused to give up, but eventually even his optomism faded along with his strength. Then, he was given water again, and food this time. The food was a raw meat of some kind, of strange texture and taste, but it was food and he didn't care about anything else.

And this it had gone for god knows how long. Every day, the water and bowl of meat. Every day, attempt after attempt to escape. To keep himself going, Goku pictured his family in his mind. Chi-Chi, Gohan, Goten and his new wife Marron, Vegeta, all his friends and family. If he was suffering in here, god knew what was happening to them. Their faces kept him going long after anyone would have given up.

But in the end…even he could only go so far.

And so here he was, chained to the wall like an animal, his clothes and hair filthy and his soul bleak with despair, almost every single gossimar thread gone. Hope could be the strongest armour you could wear, but nothing was invincible.

Goku let his head drop down, trying to again figure out how this could have happened.

And then, suddenly, light flooded his eyes, the strongest light he had seen in weeks. The light blinded him, needles of pain lancing into his eyes. He brought his hand up to block it and accidentaly brushed the collar, sending the burning needles stabbing into his body. He screamed, but his voice came out as a thin, reedy moan, his vocal cords long worn down by all the pain he had vocalized.

Burly hands seized him. Goku tried to fight back, but something slammed the collar and the burning pain throughout his whole body increased ten-fold. It was so great Goku couldn't even scream, and his head, suddenly feeling like it weighed a thousand tons, dropped down, even as his chains were removed from the wall and the hands dragged him away and out the door.

Goku tried to see, but his vision was a group of dancing white spots. But he could feel, and he knew that there was something wrong with the hands that held him. They felt far too…hot to be human hands, to rough, uneven, and coarse. Goku tried to raise his head to take a look at his captors, but a hand slammed down on the collar again and again he was consumed by the horrible pain.

And so he was dragged, down hallways, up what felt like stairs, down more hallways, and suddenly and finally deposited on a hard, cold, sticky stone floor. The hands let him go, and then Goku could no longer feel the prescene of his captors. They were gone, swallowed by the shadows that Goku had been imprisonned in.

"Oh, how low the mighty have fallen." Came a voice.

Goku raised his head as his vision began to fully clear.

He was in a large room, a room of black stone walls. The only thing in the room was a throne, a giant throne built of a strange red substance that Goku couldn't make out.

A figure sat apon the throne. It was this figure who had spoken.

"The mighty Son Goku. Once such a strong, powerful figure, a figure that never gave up and never lost hope. Now but a pathetic broken shell that has no hope at all. It has been stripped of him, for it is, in the end, forces that have no power before mine."

Goku looked at the figure as his mind continued to clear from the pain. The figure wore robes that covered all of its body. Goku could tell nothing of who it could be.

The figure rose and walked down the few stairs in front of the throne.

"You thought differently, Son Goku. You thought those forces had defeated me? They are mere emotions. I am FOREVER!"

And then as Son Goku's mind finally cleared, he realized that the voice was female.

And that he _recognized it._

"No…not you…" he groaned.

Slowly, the figure reached up and drew back the hood.

The cruel lobsided smirk on her face, and her eyes still burning pools of darkness, Agony looked as evil as she ever did.

"Yes, me, Son Goku." Agony chuckled. She tossed off her cloak to reveal her familiar outfit of purple and blood red. In the back of his mind, Goku realized she had cut her hair shot, but was still red streaked with black.

"How…we…"

"Oh yes, you turned back time. You assumed since I had…died…that I wouldn't remember this world, just like the people who had died by my hand would not remember me. Erik was wrong. I knew. Erik was always a fool, thinking he could avenge his family. I have no respect for the dead."

Goku stared, his eyes filled with shock and horror.

"Why so surprised, Son Goku? You think Erik could defeat me? I am pure evil, I am the living embodiment of man's inhumanity to its fellow man, I am the physical manifestation of the cruels hearts that everyone has in the end. As long as those feelings live, so will I. You think a mere human could defeat me? I don't think so. And he'll never get the chance. In his world, the dead stay dead. But don't worry, he has all his friends with him, along with every single lifeform on his planet. Right…here." Agony smirked, tapping her chest.

"But while their souls were powerful, they didn't grant me the godhood I remembered. It wasn't too hard to tear open another hole in the dimensions. Once I was back, I didn't waste tim like last time. I went for the throat of your world, right away."

Agony's cruel smile seemed to radiate evil so strong it almost beat down the weakened Son Goku in itself.

And then he finally registered the stickiness under his hands and liftd them to see they were coated with blood.

And then the wall behind Agony exploded outward, and Goku looked up at the noise.

And looked out apon hell. That was what the landscape had been transformed into, a black land scorched beyond repair, where red rivers flowed with blood and fires burned everywhere. A world where all humans lived in terrible, unending pain. Their screams formed into a chorus of madness and mercy which would not be granted.

Larger figures roamed among the suffering, fleeing, terrified humans, devouring them, ripping them to pieces, raping them, and doing whatever they pleased.

"I am a god again, Son Goku, and on a mountain of skulls, on a castle of pain, I sit apon a throne of blood and have my fun before I set out across the universe and consume it all!"

"NO!"

Finding strength somewhere in his battered body, Goku leapt to his feet and flew at Agony.

Agony didn't move.

And then suddenly Goku was stopped dead in mid-air. Agony's hair flared to life and lashed from her head, wrapping it's burning strands around Son Goku where he floated.

"Oh yes Son Goku. There will be no victory this time. I have seen to it myself. The game is always easy if you cheat to win."

And then Goku screamed as the hair wrapped around his right arm and tore his hand and upper forearm right off. The stump sprayed blood, splashing on Agony as she used her hair to toss Son Goku across the room. She licked it off with delight as Goku lay, crumpled, before getting to his knees, clutching his bleeding stump.

And then he looked in horror as his blood, as it dripped onto the floor, slowly drew itself along the floor across the room. He followed it with his eyes until it reached its destination, Agony's throne.

Then his eyes widened. Agony's throne wasn't carved with red rock. It was literally made of blood, blood that flowed and gushed even as it remained in the shape of a throne. Agony leaned lovingly on it, dipping her finger into it and bringing it out to lick.

"You taste as good as ever, Son Goku."

Slowly, Son Goku somehow found the strength to get to his feet. The realization came to him full force. Agony had kept him in that room for all that time to break him, to slowly grind him down to nothingness. In doing so, she would have gotten revenge and total victory.

But he would not let her have it.

"YOU...MONSTER!"

"Guilty and loving it." Agony chuckled.

Goku took a slow step towards Agony, his heart burning with rage as he somehow found power within himself to go SSJ.

"Before you die, Agony, and I WILL find a way, tell me this, what have you done to the people I care about?!?!?!?!"

Agony stared.

And then she smirked.

"What have I done, indeed." Agony snickered, before her eyes filled with cold malice.

"Look behind you."

Goku did so.

And then all the power he had was lost to him. He fell to his knees again, all pain forgotten, swallowed by complete and utter shock as he saw the grisly display of trophies Agony had arranged above her door.

Vegeta's hair, nailed to the wall by rusted spikes through his eyes, took the center stage, and around him was almost lovingly spread the heads of every single person Goku had cared about. Chi-Chi. Gohan. Goten. Bulma. Trunks. Marron. Krillian. Eighteen. Yamcha. Ubuu. Tien. Master Roshi. Chaozu. Even Mr. Satan and Buu.

"I keep them here so I can look at them and always remember what a delight was to kill all of them over again…and to get the ones I missed before. They were the first, and my best. They gave me back my godhood."

Agony pulled herself off her reclining position and walked down the stairs again, smiling cruelly at the shattered saiya-jin.

"How…could…" Goku said, his mind once again completely overwhelmed by Agony's evil.

"Because you were the ringleader. And you were the main one who humilated me before. But I do not take humilation lightly. Payback's a bitch, isn't it?"

"But why spare me? You killed them all. Why not do the same…instead of keeping me alive with water and food…?" Goku trailed off, as Agony stood, looking at him.

"Food, indeed. Why? Look Goku. Only heads. Nothing else of all the people you cared about."

Goku's eyes widened in horror. _NO…_

"What do you think you've been eating the past month?" Agony said.

And then as Goku opened his mouth as shock beyond shock, horror beyond horror, moved in and began to consume every single fibre of his being, Agony began to laugh as Goku came to the realization that Agony had turned his love of food and his appetite against him in the most horrible way possible.

"AH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA, HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA, AHAHAHAHAHAHA…"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Goku screamed as he sat up in bed, his screaming tearing through the whole Son household.

Gohan burst into the room to find his father in full SSJ3 form in his pajamas and with ki blasts charegd in both his hands.

"TOUSSAN!" he yelled.

"AGONY! AGONY! Ago…GOHAN!"

A second later Gohan found himself being crushed as his father grabbed him and held him as tight as he could. Another door opened and Goten hopped out into the hallway, trying to put on a pair of pants even as he rushed to see what the ruckus was about. He failed and fell on his face as Gohan finally managed to pry his father's arms away from him.

"Toussan, what's going on?" he said, rubbing his ribs.

"Yeah, Dad, you scared the hell out of u-woke us up." Goten hastily corrected. Marron poked her head out the door, wrapped in a sheet. Goten took advantage of his father going back into his room and his older brother following him to motion hurridly at Marron. She looked down, nodded, and disappeared back inside.

"You just had a nightmare father. We're all fine. Agony's not back. It's ok. It's ok." Gohan said, trying to comfort his father. 

Goku took a deep breath and calm down as he slipped back to normal.

"Ok…I'm better. But it seemed so real."

"Yeah. Nightmares always do, but they're just images drummed up by your sub-conscious mind. They're harmless. Go back to sleep."

"Ok…" Goku said, looking at the rumpled sheets. "Man, I'm glad Chi-Chi isn't here. She probably would have clobbered me with a frying pan for geeting so freaked out."

"Yes, she picked a good time to have an out of town family meeting, didn't she? Then again, it was probably her absence that allowed you to eat all that junk for dinner Dad. Maybe you had better stay away from the sausage and chocolate syrup pizzas before bedtime." Goten smirked.

There was no answer, and when Gohan looked back to his father from looking at his brother, he saw he was already fast asleep.

It was a beautiful morning as Goku bounded down the stairs in his usual early-morning energy rush.

"Hey Toussan! Sleep well?" Gohan said as he poked around in the fridge.

"Much better." Goku said, sitting down as Goten came into the room.

"Hey Gohan, what's for breakfast?"

"I dunno. I got a bunch of leftovers so we'll have some choice." Gohan said as he pulled himself out of the fridge with a platter of foods, some usually eaten for breakfast but some not. He walked over to the table and put the platter down in front of Goku.

"Food, Father?"

Marron heard the crash as she was coming down the stairs, and she hurried the rest of the way to the kitchen to see Gohan and Goten looking in confusion at a Goku-shapred hole in the wall and door.

"What happened?" she asked.

"I offered him food, and he suddenly got up and ran right through the door screaming "AHHHH! NO FOOD! NO FOOD!!!!!!!!"" Gohan said, mystified.

Marron peered quizzingly through the hole. The hole was picture perfect. It looked just like Goku. She giggled at the situation.

"Goku, afraid of food? I don't believe it!" she giggled.

Then, suddenly, Goku walked back into the house through the hole.

"I don't believe it either." Goku declared, and sat down and began to devour the leftovers.

Gohan smacked his forehead and muttered into his hand. Some things never changed.


End file.
